


Famous Last Words

by Beauteousmajesty



Series: Rebuilding Lives, Brick by Brick (Post Cinderbrush, Can Be Read Separately) [2]
Category: Cinderbrush (Web Series), Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet Ending, Canon Non-Binary Character, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Jamie is a mess, Post-Canon, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:34:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28001715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beauteousmajesty/pseuds/Beauteousmajesty
Summary: Jamie is banned from the Flowers' household and they could spin the wheel of ugly rumours surrounding them to discover what caused their ban. Or they could go to the source, but confronting Samuel Flowers would be a really bad idea.Also known as: Jamie Wrenly is one hell of a mess and sometimes the world's best dad makes mistakes and is definitely not the world's best dad to everyone
Series: Rebuilding Lives, Brick by Brick (Post Cinderbrush, Can Be Read Separately) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2050953
Comments: 3
Kudos: 34





	Famous Last Words

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, proceed with caution. I know the others I've written have been nice and fluffy, but I'm back from uni now and so I have the wrong name and pronouns and it's hitting a little. So head in prepared for misery.
> 
> Yes the title is an MCR song. That's the vibes, ok.

Jamie is aware of their reputation in Cinderbrush. How could they not be. The football team are so keen to fill them in. And members of the police force. And shopkeepers. Really the list of people willing to tell Jamie they are bad news is truly endless.

Their bad reputation is a multifaceted bouquet of unchangeable facts, past mistakes, and public misconceptions. And as such, Jamie is uncertain of the reasons as to why Samuel Flowers has banned them from the house. 

It could be so many things. Truly. But Jamie knows for a fact it is not the night at the rave and their vague connections the murder of Amanda Beltman that has resulted in their ban. Cam and Sasha, equally as involved, equally as implicated, are free to pop round whenever, to help Aff study or just hang out. Jamie is barred, however. 

Jamie is used to rejection. But from Aff's dad - the man they claim is the world's best dad - that hurts. They already know Greg doesn't really give a shit, so Samuel Flowers' disregard is the cherry on the cake. It wouldn't matter to them what the man who tore apart their life thinks of them, were it not for Aff. Of course the only other non-binary individual they know in the shithole that is Cinderbrush is banned from hanging out with them. 

Aff's arrival had been, is, in fact, a bright light of hope for Jamie. Their puppy-dog friendship has nudged a layer of comfort under Jamie's robust walls of 'fuck off' that they've been constructing since the divorce. Aff had thrown that book to assert their pronouns and for the first time outside of the big city Jamie experienced the bright joy of solidarity. It had been like seeing a bird miracled into a classroom with all the windows shut.

Aff gets it. Aff might be a charming example of a thembo, but talking to them about gender after a lifetime of Cinderbrush's finest cis is like talking to a fucking Greek philosopher. Aff tears through Jamie's walls like they're made of silly string and worms their way into the long abandoned space of friendship.

Aff who kissed them at the rave. The butterfly, or the president, Jamie can't remember who was what or whatever the fuck it meant. They are so far from the idea Jamie had spent years imagining them as. The child who their dad abandoned them for and Aff are such different people in their head, it takes a bit to reconcile them. And by the time the ideas have settled, it's too late, Jamie is barred from the Flowers' home.

So yeah. It hurts. Particularly so, that Jamie doesn't even know what they did. Did Samuel figure out who they are in relation to Greg? Is it their dealing? Their fashion? Their gender? Is it that unlike Sasha and Cameron, they don't even have a pretence at a nuclear family? Is it that Samuel thinks they'll hurt Aff? Does he look at Jamie with the same hate in his eyes as the countless mothers who cross their children to the other side of the road rather than walk by Jamie? It hurts, not knowing. 

They are fine, they tell the others. After all, they don't have friends, they have associates. Their walls of carefully constructed disinterest can take another assault, another rejection. Jamie Wrenly has been numb since they were eight, they can cope with this too.

Jamie Wrenly can cope with anything. They took a bullet to the gut and kept on fighting. They can take another rejection to the face and keep on going. They can. They can. (They can't).

Jamie knows for a fact that they can't have a breakdown, otherwise a lifetime of repressed emotions are going to come to visit and they don't have the capacity to deal with them. So when Sasha and Cameron vanish for another study session at Aff's, they find a distraction.

Their stock has never been so well organised. Their spell components have been reorganised more this month than the last five combined. They have walked every road, over and over. They have become a goth bat haunting Cinderbrush. They don't do homework on principle, but if they did it would be better than the essays Cameron pays for. They are fine. This new rejection slides right off their carefully constructed walls. They don't care about it.

One such walk lands them outside of the liquor store. There's few enough places to go in Cinderbrush that this is inevitable. Aff isn't on shift. Aff is with Sasha and Cameron and they are probably not working on that English essay they talked about. Samuel Flowers is the only one in the store. 

Jamie knows the store well from their surreptitious visits when Aff is working alone. Their eyes peer through the glass automatically as they pass, seeking Aff. They make eye contact with Samuel, who hates them, as they pass. They definitely pass the store. They don't open the door and go in. They know when to avoid conflict. They pass the store. (They don't pass the store).

Jamie finds themself in the liquor store, fists balled in their coat's pockets. Samuel Flowers is looking at them as they march up to the counter with the rhythmic stomp of platform boots. This is a bad idea. They can't stop. 

'Jamie.' Samuel's voice is wary. There's none of the warmth in it that gets directed at Aff, or the polite care given to Aff's other friends, Aff's better friends. Jamie has done nothing and Samuel is already done with them. Jamie doesn't care. They have been numb since they were eight. Nothing can hurt them. They can stare hatred in the face and come out stronger. 'I don't need to see your ID to know you're too young to be in here. What are you doing in my store?'

'What did it?' Jamie blurts, skating at the edge of scathing, 'what about me makes me unworthy of Aff's friendship?'

They are not upset. And even if they were, it wouldn't find its way into their voice when they spoke. Jamie has been hiding their emotions and reactions for years. This won't break them. This is no worse than the wrong pronouns, than the wrong name, than you looked so much better back then, than of course I like it but I miss the old you. Jamie has years of apathy. They don't care. It can't hurt them.

'You're a bad influence, Jamie. Surely you know that. Aff is-' Samuel might trail off, but Jamie hears the end of the sentence. They've heard it before. 

'Yeah.' Jamie agrees, 'Aff is too good for me, I know.' The fight that had flooded into Jamie's veins to drag them into the store is gone now. Jamie is just so tired.

'Look here, you. If you have aspirations after Aff, you better think again. They are too good for the likes of you.' Oh, this is what a defensive parent feels like. Jamie is looking at perhaps everything this man robbed from them and feeling it turned on them as a weapon. They feel the anger bleed back into their veins, feel the weeks of anger management sessions evaporate like morning mist, as this man tells them what romantic decisions they can and can't make.

They laugh bitterly. 'Like you're qualified to talk about good relationships and who's worthy of what. How many marriages and relationships have you ruined?'

He is thrown, visibly, for a moment before Samuel Flowers is angry. 'Who told you that? What right do you have to come into my store and talk about things you have no knowledge of and no right to talk about.'

Jamie laughs cold. There's another option off the list. 'You have no idea who I am, do you? Do the faces of the people whose lives you've ruined all blend together or do you just not care?'

A beat. Jamie breathes heavily, angrily. Samuel takes a step back, looks at Jamie again. There's an attempt at recognition but no flash of knowledge in his eyes. He stares at Jamie like a mystery.

'All those mornings, sneaking out before mom got in from the night shift and you didn't even think to break from ruining my parents' marriage long enough to take in the child alone in the kitchen. You didn't stop and look at the divorce court. You didn't think about the mess your affair left behind. I'm unworthy of Aff's company? That's nothing compared to the man who made me so.'

Jamie has years of bitterness to draw on. They have a well practiced scathing tone and their walls are built high and strong. This is every shower argument they've ever planned to win. But it feels empty. There's no satisfaction in watching understanding flit across Aff's dad's face. They are just numb. 

Jamie is numb all through the silence that follows. The store clock ticks. Occasional cars rumble past. Samuel's eyes flit over Jamie.

'You're Jamie. That Jamie.'

Jamie just nods. This response isn't anticipated. The versions in their mind involve more shouting. More opportunities for Jamie to win. This is empty realisation. Samuel's face is pale with recognition. 

He doesn't say anything. Jamie doesn't know what they want to hear, if anything. Nothing can atone for the pain they definitely don't feel. The hollowness of their victory spreads like ice from their heart and catches in their throat and eyes, forcing the edge of tears and a faint choking for breath. This isn't what they imagined.

They are Jamie Wrenly. They can take a bullet and fight on stronger. They don't cry. They can't cry. They retreat back to lean their weight against a shelf. Anger that once filled their veins has melted into years worth of grief driven sorrow. Greg doesn't want them. This man doesn't remember them. Their mom doesn't have a moment for them. Even their closest associates fumble their pronouns. And they're meeting up without them. They don't need them. They long for the bullet wound. They wouldn't get up this time and waste it.

Samuel is talking but holding in tears is too loud. Jamie can't hear. Jamie can't breathe. They stumble into the shelf, bringing their hands up to silence the quietly escaping sobs.

Samuel retreats and Jamie crumples. They let their shawl obscure them, tucking their head to their knees. Time passes, they think. They can't hear the clock any more. They can't hear anything beyond shaking breaths that jolt their entire body. They have years and years of sorrow to get through and it courses through their body unchecked. They hate it. They hate everything.

Time is unreal on the floor. There is deafening silence punctuated by the ticking of the clock, the pounding of Jamie's blood, and the sound of arythmic sobbing. If Samuel speaks, Jamie doesn't hear it. Jamie doesn't even care to hear it. What does Samuel matter? He is a disappointing reality to those years of shower-imagined opponents. 

They trace a pattern between the splodges of the linoleum floor. It's a grimy kind of grey, Aff says they inherited it with the building. They can trace out strange sigils in the old stains that spatter around the base of the shelving unit they are leaning against.

God, what are they doing here? They have better things to be doing than crying on this floor. Jamie scrubs at their eyes with the back of one hand. Fuck their eyeliner. It had been days old anyway. They spend a moment wondering how they are going to get off this floor whilst still retaining some dignity, before they remember they've seen Samuel Flowers' walks of shame, and also that they're Jamie fucking Wrenly and they don't give a shit what anyone thinks of them. After all, Sasha only brought in pronoun badges for Aff, Jamie's been living the dream out here in Cinderbrush.

They push themself to their feet, adjusting the angle of their hat and pushing back their sunglasses. People don't bother to look twice at them, they're good to go. They spare a brief glance at Samuel Flowers before they leave, wordlessly, fumbling in their pocket for something to take their mind off it, head held high as they sweep out into the backstreets of Cinderbrush.

They don't know why, Aff says the next week, but for some reason Samuel Flowers has revoked his ban on Jamie in the house. Jamie offers no insight on why they think this might be, just leans back, dangerously, on the shitty plastic school chair before casually accepting Aff's invitation to come over.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry. Let me know if you survived to the end


End file.
